Life with the ’57 wasn’t always so grand, though. Ben bought the ’57 as an unfinished project car, salivating at the thought of carving corners in an off-beat hot rod. The 47-year-old retired investor had dabbled in multiple racing disciplines. He ran NHRA Supergas with Jack Beckman (Yes, that Jack Beckman) as his crew chief and headed south to Mexico to race the SCORE Baja 1000 off-road race. Ben had high expectations for the Tri-Five. Already painted, the car ostensibly needed just a few finishing details. Ben’s first trip to Willow Springs Raceway quickly turned sour.

“I took it out on the Big Willow course and realized the car was unfit for track use. The swaybar was locked up, the fuel system failed, and the steering fell apart. It was a nightmare. The 454 was getting hot. Once I realized it wasn’t safe, I put the project on ice. That was in 2007 or 2008.”

Ben had spent a pretty penny purchasing the ’57 so it’s no surprise he took awhile to get over the sting of buying a car that was so bad that it literally had no axle seals in the rearend. Once he mentally (and financially) recovered from the debacle, he sent the car to John Hays and equipped him with a low-six-figure budget to finish the build and “make it fast and reliable.” Hays took one look at the ’57 and decided to blow the entire car apart. Twelve months later, every inch of the car had been gone through. The front framehorns were notched to accommodate a wider aluminum radiator. The rear of the chassis was reworked to accept a 30-gallon fuel cell.

“By the time Ben got the car, we had to go through the entire drivetrain to make the car more streetable and reliable. Everything mechanical was scrutinized, replaced, powdercoated, or anodized.”— John Hays

5/21You don’t see ’57 Chevys shredding turns at road courses, which is why this one makes us feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

Hays found himself redoing almost everything inside the car because it had several owners and each one modded the Tri-Five in ways Hays deemed unfit for its intended use. The front of the cage needed tweaking to mount a dry-sump oil tank, and it took a significant amount of time to build a custom wiring harness to incorporate a Racepak data acquisition system. The big-block Chevy that Hays assembled was stout, but equally impressive were the lengths he went to in order ensure proper alignment of the pulleys in the front accessory drive system; it shouldn’t throw a belt at 8,000 rpm. Raw steel and aluminum parts wouldn’t do, so Hays sent everything out for powdercoating and anodizing and then assembled the entire car with ARP hardware.

Toward the end of the build, veteran driver John Morton aided in setting up the suspension geometry to make sure the ’57 would indeed stick in the corners. The team put together one hell of a street-legal race car with air conditioning and an attitude. The plan is to drive the car on the street several thousand miles per year and hit half a dozen open track sessions as well. In short, the goal for this car is a user-friendly hot rod that above all is fun to wheel. With more than 800 hp under the hood and a five-speed stick to row the gears with, there’s no reason this silver beast won’t meet Ben’s needs.

The Science Behind Custom-Built Headers

George Rumore, sales manager at Stainless Works, didn’t build the headers on Ben Thomas’ Chevy, but if he had, these are the questions he would have asked Ben before starting the build.

HRM] What specs do you need from the customer?

GR] There is a lot of information required to build a custom set of headers. Horsepower level, cam duration, static compression, cylinder head design, and the style of performance driving the client intends to use the car for. The reason that this is important is to make a set of headers that supports the volumetric efficiency of the motor. This information is also key to design a header that works best in the rpm range the client plans on using the vehicle.

HRM] What are the various grades of stainless you build headers from, and what are the pros and cons of each?

GR] We build all of our headers out of U.S.-sourced 304L material. We use both 16- and 18-gauge-thick material. We use the heavier wall thickness on most turbo applications due to the amount of exhaust gas temperature these combinations can produce. We use the 18-gauge in street car applications. This material has excellent heat-retention properties. Stainless steel retains most of the heat inside the interior of the tube, whereas mild steel radiates the heat through the material, into the engine compartment.

HRM] What determines the style of collector you’ll use for the header build?

GR] It’s determined on a case-by-case basis.

HRM] Are stepping the primary tubes a guarantee of more power versus single-size tubes?

GR] Nothing is guaranteed. First, you need a properly sized header. We base our decision on what the motor wants. A stepped header helps speed up the velocity of the exhaust gases out of the cylinder head. It creates a scavenging effect through the entire header, releasing the gases into the atmosphere at a much faster rate. The most important thing to remember is that bigger is not always better. A properly designed header will make more power than one that is not designed for the application.

21/21The body of this street car is all metal.

Factoids

Wilwood offers several variations of the popular aluminum Wide-5 hub, which is primarily used in circle-track and road-racing events.

’57 Chevys built by the Southern Engineering and Development Company (SEDCO) and called “Black Widows” were popular and successful on the 1957 NASCAR circuit.